even though it’s been years since i’ve played the thousand-year door it was still somewhat surprising how much that game took wholesale from this game. not only are the mechanics pretty much identical, but even the supporting cast is pretty much functionally the same (and three characters, a goomba, a koopa, and a bob-omb, have pretty much exactly the same abilities in both games). despite the close similarities, it had been long enough since i’d played TTYD that i didn’t feel like it was too much of a chore to play through this game. the pacing of all the paper mario games has been slow due to mario’s slow walking speed, although this game includes a dash ability that makes getting around a bit faster. the game is as wordy as the subsequent two games in the series, which could potentially get annoying, but for the most part you can skip conversations with NPCs and not worry about missing anything and so the optional dialogue serves as a nice way of making the world feel more alive without necessarily slowing things down too much. the game’s pace is steady and for most RPG fans a good length, and the battle mechanics are generally entertaining, although as repetitive as most RPGs. the badge mechanic is a great substitute for the traditional stat-boosting equipment found in other RPGs, and is satisfying without being overly simple.

despite being very similar to TTYD, i would give this game the edge overall. i found the original to be more enjoyable not just because it was a solid first entry in what has become a regular series but also because the situations and locales feel more epic and unique. (TTYD makes much better use of the paper conceit, though, with mario gaining paper-specific powers, such as turning into a paper airplane.) anyway, i was motivated to finish this game so that i could continue on with the M&L series and get into the 3DS paper mario entry. i’ve actually already dipped into sticker star and am up to the second world, and i’m really enjoying the new mechanics and the different pace. i’ll prob. be posting more on that before too long.

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this post is going to fairly controversial, because most of it is going to be spent complaining about the N64 fan-favorite goldeneye 007. i had played through the first level and gotten stuck on the second level and put it aside awhile back, but i finally came back to it and forced myself to spend some serious time with the game. it wasn’t a pleasant experience. i’m not a huge of fan of FPSes in general, but i had enjoyed my brief experience with doom; but this game was rife with the one thing i just can’t tolerate in a game, which is “try-and-die” gameplay. maybe i’m just the slowest gamer who’s ever touched this game, or maybe i was at a disadvantage since i haven’t seen the movie, but the amount of trial and error i had to wade through was ridiculous. the game includes multiple objectives for each mission, with more objectives required at the two higher difficulty levels. i found the objectives to be vaguely defined in general, and more often than not i would end up wasting time trying to complete an objective that wasn’t even required for the initial difficulty level because i didn’t realize it was part of a different objective. it was particularly maddening whenever the try-and-die gameplay reared its ugly head in the very last sections of a stage, which happened often, and i can’t count the number of times natalya jumped in front of my gun. ugh! escort missions at their worst. the enemies lack variety, and from a modern gameplaying perspective it also really bugged me that bond could have a plethora of gadgets at his disposal but couldn’t get as simple a thing as a map as part of his intel.

i tried out the multiplayer mode, and i wasn’t really into it but, again, it’s probably just that i’m not a fan of the genre. i did appreciate how easy it was for my n00b bf to pick it up and play it, and in terms of the historic context, the game was noteworthy for being one of the first console FPS local multiplayer games.

i’m glad i can finally cross this game off of my list, and although it was a significant setback in my interest in FPSes, i’m looking forward to moving on to try out other well-regarded games in the genre. my initial experience of FPSes post-goldeneye has been somewhat encouraging, and hopefully there will be more to come on that before too long.

i’ve been meaning to get into the yoshi series more after having played and loved super mario world 2: yoshi’s island. next up was yoshi’s story for N64. whether it was intentionally designed to be so or not i don’t know, but the game feels like an early case of nintendo trying to balance casual vs. hardcore gameplay even way back in 1997, and as with similar, more-recent efforts this attempt was unjustly maligned and misunderstood.

the game has a completely unique premise in that it’s incredibly simple to reach the end of a single playthrough since you just have to find 30 pieces of fruit for yoshi to eat to progress and fruit is plentiful. at a minimum on a single playthrough you’d encounter only 6 levels and two bosses, which includes the final boss. after this initially baffling experience i realized that the game is actually quite clever in its setup: each “page” (i.e. world) contains 4 levels of increasing difficulty, but on a single playthrough you only play one of the four. to unlock all the stages in the next page you have to hunt down hearts that are hidden in the current stage. so already the difficulty of the game is completely up to you since you can choose to play the harder stages (which also means choosing to hunt for all the hearts).

the main challenge of the game is clearly not just in finishing the game, then, or actually even playing through all the levels. the real challenge of the game is to skip all the easy-to-find fruit in favor of yoshi’s favorite fruit, melons, in order to achieve a high score. hunting down all 30 melons in each stage is certainly time consuming, although this is a case where the game’s “challenge” is more about painstakingly searching every corner of a stage (often by stopping to use yoshi’s “sniff-sniff” ability) as opposed to feats requiring actual platforming prowess. this type of monotonous gameplay isn’t particularly engaging, but there are enough more-worthwhile challenges to keep one reasonably engaged. it’s somewhat hard to get too excited about the quest for a high score in a platformer such as this, but putting the attention on the collection aspect gives the game more of a focus.

it’s easy to see why people who didn’t delve into the game at all would dismiss it too quickly, but even after playing through every stage, many several times, my enjoyment with the game didn’t rise to the levels one would expect from a nintendo platformer. yoshi’s abilities are a nice expansion on his/its SMW2 skills (minus the whining baby, fortunately), and there are some nice references to that title, including the awesome huffin’ puffins. there are definitely moments of brilliance, many quite original, scattered throughout as well; highlights include a helpful white shy guy, hidden black yoshis and white yoshis, and levels in which you roll through a hamster wheel and ride on a dragon. but those moments aren’t quite plentiful enough, even with all the new enemies introduced (not many of which, it seems, have continued on, which is a shame as some of them are memorable). the pop-up book art style didn’t grab me, although it’s interesting to compare it to the recent wii release kirby’s epic yarn, which also has an arts ‘n crafts aesthetic. the game has some mini-games scattered throughout that require complete mastery for completing the “melon quest”, and this and other perfection-requiring objectives are a definite nuisance. the game is also notable for introducing yoshi’s love-it-or-hate-it voice (courtesy of composer kazumi totaka), and also including totaka’s song.

all in all this is an enjoyable enough platformer that, while certainly not an all-time great especially by nintendo’s lofty standards, is definitely underrated, especially considering the fact that it’s a throwback to 2-d platforming at a time when 3-d platforming was becoming the new norm. yoshi’s next two outings were similarly experimental, so it’ll be interesting to see how his/its series shapes up.

i’ve been continuing to play a lot of sequels (or titles that spawned sequels, as the case may be), although i have a few standalones coming up in the near future. i’d been meaning to play another N64 game for a while, so i though i’d give myself a little mindless break after the punishing f-zero and have a quick playthrough of pokemon puzzle league.

for better or worse i was quite mistaken, though. although i had been right in assuming that the game would be pretty much the same gameplay-wise as the two previous panel de pon aka tetris attack titles i had played (although with pokemon trappings instead of yoshi’s island ones), there was one significant difference: namely the addition of some painful levels of difficulty. although i knew that there was definite room for improvement in my skillz, i’d thought that by now i would be at least good enough to get through most challenges with enough continues, but sadly this proved to be far from the case. on the very hard 1-player setting PPL is rough: the CPU will regularly do 7+-chains repeatedly, and there’s apparently a super hard mode for people who want even more punishment. i worked on polishing my skills and made some progress so that i can now do 3- or 4-chains somewhat regularly, but after a while it just seemed like too much effort to match the computer and i was just too demoralized to continue. i’m sure there are many who have become true puzzle league masters and can breeze through even the super hard levels, but i took comfort in my improvements and have put the game aside for another day.

outside of the regular 1P mode vs the CPU, there’s also a 1P solo mode that incorporates the game’s most unique feature, which is a 3D board that wraps around in a cylindrical shape. that mode also gets to be more frustrating than fun in the later stages because it becomes focused more on quick combos as opposed to chains, and i’m not quite sure that the 3D version really adds that much, but it does provide some variety. the game also includes the usual puzzle mode (a limited number of moves to clear the board), timed and marathon modes, and 2P modes, along with a create-your-own-puzzle mode that i didn’t bother with. i had thought the game might include at least something involving pokemon beyond its presentation, but it doesn’t. although you can select one of your character’s three pokemon before a battle, your choice apparently doesn’t have any effect whatsoever. the pokemon visuals and sound effects are from the TV series and are colorful although the voice samples are fairly annoying, but in the kind of “so annoying it’s kind of entertaining” way, e.g. team rocket’s “i’m feeling giddy!” and “mee-owwth” and ash’s “i’m a pokemon master!”.

it’s kind of hard to rate this game. in terms of its presentation i prefer the less grating yoshi skin, and in terms of the difficulty i suppose i can’t mark it down for containing higher levels than i’ll get to anytime soon. the 3D mode isn’t a big draw, so overall i suppose this is a game for people who don’t mind the pokemon trappings and are seeking more of a challenge, or for people who really love the pokemon anime series. apparently the game boy color version has some minor pokemon collecting, so i’ll be tackling that one next, although i don’t expect it to be as difficult as this one. incidentally, this is one of the few nintendo games that have been released in the US and europe but not japan.

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i hadn’t really been that into super mario kart when i played it last year, but i found myself curious about its first sequel, mario kart 64. MK64 has the advantage of true 3-D graphics and as a result much more varied tracks, but it also offers up some great new items (triple green and red shells, the ghost item, the fake question block, and the dreaded blue shell). the biggest changes to the setup are that each cup consists of 4 tracks instead of 5, there are less laps, and you get unlimited retries. all those changes make the game much, much easier, something i found myself having mixed feelings about but in the end preferred.

because of the latter changes and also because the tracks were easier (it seemed like there were far fewer hairpin turns), in general i didn’t have much problem getting the golds all the way up to the 150cc mode using my man luigi (didn’t bother with mirror mode, though). like many sequels, MK64 feels like a leap forward, and i ended up enjoying it much more than SMK; in fact, it’s made me a convert to the series. the main complaint people continue to have about the series is that the AI opponents pull off superhuman feats and that the better items are given to those who are losing. in my playthrough of the solo mode i found the AI’s rubberbanding to be a bit annoying, but given that your computer opponents are usually relying on weaker weapons (e.g. banana peels) and pretty much never chuck a red shell at you i didn’t think it was too unfair. i also didn’t have much of a problem with the item distribution, and i actually really grew to like the fact that even if you make some mistakes you can still win a race thanks to some much-needed items when you’re lagging behind. racing games in general rely on perfection more than most, something i dislike in games in general, but the kart series helps alleviate those types of headaches. and even though the item distribution makes for a more casual experience, the game still requires more than blind luck to win each race. i can definitely see how the item randomness could be a big pain in a multiplayer game, though.

all in all, despite being a bit too easy this was a thoroughly enjoyable game, and despite some misgivings i decided to give it the benefit of the doubt since it’s just too much stupid fun and i officially inducted it into my “top games of all time” list. it doesn’t look like the series has evolved very much, but i’m looking forward to trying out the rest of the series (although it looks like the next entry, super circuit on the GBA is a bit of a step back).

due to the game’s re-release there’s been tons of discussion about it online these days. despite its reuse of much of the design of ocarina of time, the game is as much a black sheep of the zelda series as zelda II: the adventure of link was. the game is noted for being darker in tone than the rest of the series, with the disaster of the moon crashing into the earth always looming literally overhead. the central game mechanic, in which you replay the same three days over and over again, a la the classic movie groundhog day, is amazingly innovative, even almost 9 years later. the game hasn’t gotten nearly as much attention as it deserves, perhaps partly because of its unusual mechanics, but also perhaps it was a bit ahead of its time. hopefully now it will reach a broader audience who can appreciate what a great game it is.

and what a great game it is! i’ve been enjoying my progression through the zelda series, but after i finished ocarina, zelda fatigue was threatening to set in. luckily this game provided a real breath of fresh air and in fact it’s joined my list of “favorite games of all time”. this isn’t to say it’s without its flaws, though. one of the main complaints people have about it is that the time limit sometimes makes you repeat extended sequences of actions, which can be frustrating to say the least. and even outside of the time limit there are some places where the game sets you up so that it’s highly likely that you’ll have to repeat a section because you didn’t complete it on the right day. in my case the problem with the repetitions was compounded by the fact that either my N64 or my expansion pak is buggy, because when i zipped through areas the way i usually do the game would freeze. once i got used to slowing down and letting the camera catch up with me i was usually fine, though, although there were still way too many occasions where i’d have to redo whole sections even beyond what a normal playthrough of the game would entail. extremely frustrating, but the game was definitely worth slogging through that issue and any other quibbles i might have with the game.

in addition to the completely absorbing and fresh central game mechanic, there’s also a more complex story than usual that unfolds well. it seems that the game’s designers made a conscious effort to make the characters come alive. in this interview from nintendo power tezuka, one of the supervisors of the game says:

There were a number of characters in Ocarina of Time that we wanted to describe more fully. We didn’t have the means to do it in Ocarina, but in Majora’s Mask we do because players have the opportunity to meet every character in the game and learn more about them.

in response to the question “Is there anything you weren’t able to accomplish in Ocarina of Time that you have included in Majora’s Mask?” miyamoto adds:

Yes. In fact, that is why we’ve decided to base the game on the three-day intervals. This allows gamers to see characters as they go through their daily routines in more detail. Depending on which time of day you visit a particular character, he or she will be doing different things.

one of the things i really appreciated about the game was how well the side quests are integrated into the game. a lot of the side quests involve the characters you’re constantly running into in the town, which serves as the home base. so while you’re preparing for the next part of the main quest, it’s almost impossible not to become curious about what’s going on with these other characters, and before you know it you’re deeply involved in trying to help them with their problems. also, because of the time mechanic there are many times where you’re forced to wait around for a particular time of day, so in those cases the side quests and the mini-games, like the shooting gallery, become ideal ways to pass the time (assuming that you don’t get sucked into them and lose track of time as i repeatedly did). in fact, because of the game’s design i ended up doing way more sidequests than i usually do. also, the sidequests where you have to find and collect useless tokens (in this game, as in ocarina, they’re golden skulltulas) are contained in two skulltula houses instead of scattered all over the game map, and i completed both of those as well.

well, not much else to say without getting into the details of the game and spoiling some of the surprises. but let it suffice to say that there hasn’t been a game that has sucked me in so completely in quite a while, as my significant other will attest. a flawed masterpiece, but one that i highly recommend every gamer should experience. (oh, and in case you were wondering, when you beat the game, the game automatically saves so that you keep anything you accomplished in the last 3-day time period you played.)

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i’ve been really slow about playing N64 games, but i finished gauntlet legends a couple of days ago. i was actually surprised at how much i enjoyed this game. it seems one of the main complaints about the game is that it’s so easy, but after having played some more effortful games recently it was actually nice to have something completely mindless. it was also one of the few games i could not only coerce the bf to play with me once but that he enjoyed enough to play with me a second time.

i haven’t played a whole lot of hack ‘n slash games and no doubt the genre has evolved a lot since the 8-bit gauntlet days, but there was a lot i liked about this, the series’ first 3D iteration. first off, a lot of the elements of the original 8-bit gauntlet (and its sequels) that you know and love are intact, including the 4 characters (warrior, valkyrie, wizard, and archer) who are all still distinct, and the great voice samples (“i like food!” being one of the clear favorites, although we don’t get to hear my favorite line from the 8-bit days which was “wizard has shot the food!” since, thankfully, you’re not able to shoot food in this game).

in terms of additions, unlike the original game and the arcade version of legends the console versions don’t have your life ticking away every second. this of course makes the game much easier, as does the addition of turbo moves (your “turbo” meter continually recharges), a whole slew of powerups, and, most importantly, the ability to level up and buy stat upgrades (i.e. strength, speed, magic, and armor). so although the four character classes have varied starting stats and growths, over time the differences become much less apparent. the game also lets you pick the color of your character, which changes its model, and also includes animal skins of the four classes (e.g. falconess for the valkyrie) which, while not really adding anything, are kind of a nice little addition.

the game includes a world hub where you can choose any level you’ve already unlocked, and so the game becomes trivially easy since you can level up as much as you want before tackling harder levels. but even with its two harder difficulty settings (which didn’t seem that different to me when i took a cursory look at them) the game would still be pretty easy. a lot of this seems to come from the fact you can take out most enemy generators from far away before they’ve had time to spawn many enemies; in this game generators don’t spawn enemies until you get near to them, but i believe in the original 8-bit games they spawned enemies as soon as you start the stage, thus building up oceans of enemies for you to tediously plow through. and if you save the powerups you get and sell them instead of use them, you won’t have to spend much time level-grinding, if at all. i didn’t start off being very methodical about traversing the stages, so i ended up repeating a fair number of the levels because there are hidden items you have to find to beat the game (i.e. “obelisks” which allow you to enter other worlds, and “runes” which allow you to tackle the final boss) as well as optional items (e.g. the secret characters, weapons for use against the bosses). and you’ll find yourself wanting to repeat easier levels just to collect more health. without those repeats the game would’ve been more of a challenge, but the fun of the game really isn’t about the difficulty anyway.

another thing that people complain about is the graphics, which despite being N64-level didn’t bother me at all (although apparently the dreamcast version is better). the game does make use of the N64 expansion pack though. given that the screen could be full of enemies and up to 4 players, all in 3D, the sprites aren’t incredibly detailed, but they work much better than most of the screenshots would suggest. i also found the progression of the levels to be well paced: the first world contains levels that are mostly linear; the second world contains levels that are more maze-like, like the original gauntlet; the third world contains more large open field-like areas where you’ll find yourself surrounded by enemies on multiple sides, along with a fun level climbing up and down the rigging of an airship; and the fourth and final worlds are twistier and generally much less linear with more back-tracking. in the latter levels there are some areas where you’ll be a bit lost, but that generally comes more from the confusion from the graphics and areas looking too similar to one another than anything else. the automatic camera in general also works pretty well, and the music is fine although not particularly memorable. the enemies aren’t quite varied enough, but they’re serviceable. my primary complaint, and one shared by others, is the inclusion of boss battles; they’re mostly pointless, mainly because the bosses all have attacks that are completely unavoidable and unblockable.

so overall this one was a pleasant surprise and has lead me to spending a lot more digital ink on it than many other games i’ve played this year. i actually found it to be more enjoyable than the x-men legends game i played a couple of years ago, i think largely due to it having more variety and level design. there’s a remake with more levels and characters called dark legacy that came out on the gamecube that i’ll def. have to pick up at some point. and if you’re wondering, in terms of the three console versions of gauntlet legendsIGN rated them in this order: dreamcast: 8.4, N64: 7.7, and PS1: 7.2. it looks like the PS1 version, while taking the hardest hit in the graphics department, has the inclusion of 4 additional hard levels after you beat the game.